Cracked vertebrae! Bloody noses! Black eyes! We’ve had some eye-openers with the women’s cycling these past few days.
These women are every bit as crazy as the men who whizz down and around bends at breakneck speeds.
Crazier even!
Anyone who saw Dutch cyclist Annemiek van Vleuten come a cropper in the road race on Sunday will certainly check their brakes a million times before setting off anywhere in a hurry.
As the RTÉ duo Declan Quigley and PJ Nolan remarked during the Time Trial: “Annemiek been sending messages from the hospital. She’s cracked a few vertebrae. She’s got a hell of a shiner, bumps and bruises.”
All of which left us thinking that these women are made from some seriously strong stuff.
Thankfully, this time, there were no crashes anything like the one suffered by Van Vleuten but the Time Trial brought its own share of drama with “part-time cyclist” – according to PJ – Kristin Armstrong, who works as a community health director at St Luke’s Hospital in Boise, Idaho, defying a bloody nose to claim her third successive gold medal in the discipline.
And all a day before her 43rd birthday. “She’s left it all on the road and now she’s all over the road, trying to recover,” Quigley informed us as Armstrong, firstly wiping away the blood from her nose bleed, chose the road surface to rest her weary limbs rather than the No 1 seat reserved for the gold medallist.
Achievement
But probably the biggest achievement was that Armstrong – most likely hanging up her bicycle clips – pushed Olga Zabelinskaya off the winner’s podium. Not literally, but the American’s winning time did remove the controversial Russian from the gold medal position.
Back in the studio, former world champion Martyn Irvine left us in no doubt how delighted he was that Zabelinskaya had missed out on the gold.
Why had Armstrong won? Joanne Cantwell wondered. “Because she was best up the hill, down the hill and on the flat,” replied Irvine, who was lying in wait for what Joanne was teeing him up for next.
“Now,” said JC, “the big controversy surrounds Olga Zabelinskaya, the reason being she actually served a doping ban for 18 months, was cleared by the Russian Cycling Federation, the UCI [Union Cycliste Internationale] appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and she eventually accepted it [the ban] in order to be able to compete.”
Any sympathy? Not a bit of it, as the Ulsterman straightened up in his chair as if moving up the gears for an uphill assault. “She shouldn’t be there in my eyes. There is no clear black and white, they need to set a line in the sand that every federation should stick to . . . Anyone who has served a ban for hardcore doping should not be allowed back in the sport in my eyes.”
Ah sure, she only took some fat-burners. “Is that considered hardcore?” asked Joanne.
Cheat
Irvine nodded. “Yes. It’s as simple as if you are a regimented, healthy living person you will keep weight; if you want to lose it faster you take these. It is a cheat, [taking] these fat burners. It’s a cheat. Any cyclist knows your worst enemy is the weight and going uphill. It’s the KGs, it’s your belly that’s holding you back. It is not your ability. I don’t think there is any place for people like that.”
A few KGs around the belly? “It’s just the gravity,” added Irvine, speaking from personal experience. “Gravity hates me and it has cursed my career travelling uphill. Anyone carrying weight, you can’t climb as fast.”
All of which provided as good an insight as you’d get into why Zabelinskaya used the cheating fat burners in the first place.
Over on the BBC, there wasn’t the gnashing of teeth we’d expected after Chris Froome’s quest for gold didn’t quite work out. Froome took bronze in the time trial behind veteran Swiss cyclist Fabian Cancellara, with Tom Dumoulin continuing the Dutch medal haul with a bronze.
Precious metal
Best post-race interview of the short-and-not-so-sweet variety? Not from the gold, silver or bronze medallists but Aussie Rohan Dennis who missed out on a piece of precious metal after the tri-bar on his handlebars snapped midrace and he was forced to cycle on before getting a replacement bike.
As interviewer Jill Douglas asked him for his sob story, Dennis responded: “Shit happens, to put it simply.”
“Apologies if anyone’s offended by his expletive,” Douglas interjected.
